First leaked back in March and subsequently spotted getting FCC’s stamp of approval, Huawei’s MediaPad 7 Vogue tablet has finally become official a few hours ago.

For now, you can only hope to find the budget-friendly 7-incher in Taiwan, but there’s a good chance Huawei has plans for a soon to happen wider rollout. At first glance, the MediaPad 7 Vogue is a very elegant slab of silicon with not that much oomph beneath its hood.

What sets it apart from slates like Google’s Nexus 7 though is voice call support, meaning it’s likely going to be targeted against “hybrids” such as the Asus Fonepad instead of the N7. But does it have what it takes to beat the Fonepad to the punch?

As far as pricing goes, it looks that way. In Taiwan, the Vogue will cost TW$8,990, which is around 300 US bucks. For comparison, the upgraded Asus Fonepad, packing an Intel Atom Z2460 CPU and 32 GB of on-board storage, goes for NT$10,900, or US$360.

Sadly, Huawei’s new slate only comes with 8 GB of internal memory (expandable via microSD), plus its display is fairly average, boasting a 1,024 x 600 pixels resolution. The 1.2 GHz MediaTek MT6589 quad-core CPU is unlikely to give the Intel Atom inside the Fonepad a run for its money, though it should help ensure a healthy autonomy between charges.

The rest of the Vogue’s features are pretty run-of-the-mill too and include 1 GB of RAM, a 3 MP rear snapper, VGA front cam, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, GPS, plus Android 4.1 Jelly Bean with the Emotion UI on top.

The thing’s design is pretty eye-catching and it can definitely be considered a strong point, but ultimately the MediaPad 7 Vogue is not that much lighter or thinner than the Asus Fonepad (335 vs 340 grams and 9.5 vs 10.4 mm).

Bottom line, if Huawei wants to be taken seriously in the tablet world, they need to do better than this. Specifically, if the MediaPad 7 Vogue is to ever become a global hit, a price cut and/or spec bump are recommended, nay, required.